This is the dinner time mantra chanted by my little boy, Isaac. “I just want one thing, mommy, just one!” He’s not specific about what he wants. But, he’s confident of this: there should be only one item on his plate. He can make it through dinner if he only has to focus on one food.
Now, I am a good cook. I’m not boasting or anything, I just do pretty well in the kitchen. So, in my head it doesn’t make sense. He should be able to enjoy whatever I’m putting on his plate. I try to make it healthy and balanced, veggies, meats; a variety of yummy things. The process of mealtime shouldn’t be so daunting, but it is for him.
In my mind I don’t understand his request for “just one thing….”
But my heart doesn’t blame him one little bit. I find myself making the same request. Recently, I have found myself amid different trials… all at once. I won’t go into details here, but complications have come up. Things aren’t going quite the way I planned. Some are big and seem life changing, some are little, the result minute ; altogether they add up to overwhelming frustration and confusion. Peace is nowhere to be found.
And I said to my Heavenly Father: “Why can’t we just do these one at a time? I can trust You much more easily, when it is one thing at a time.”
But He spoke to my heart and said, “My grace is sufficient in your weakness… If trusting me is easy for you to do “one thing at a time”, you aren’t weak… and that means you aren’t applying my grace to your heart. I don’t want you to overcome on your own. I want you to experience the joy of my salvation: the widespread, fully consuming relief that comes with my provision and my mercy.”
The scripture memory work I’ve started this summer with a friend, is old to me, but brand new as I think about it… It’s plural. Not just one…
James 1: 2-4
2 My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, 3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. 4 But let patience have itsperfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.
If I truly desire to be more like Him, I’m going to have to do it on His plan. I can’t request for Him to mold me as He chooses, and then ask for Him to do it my way, “one thing at a time.” He knows how to prepare what is very best for me. The good news is: His will is to produce patience through faith. and He has promised to be my strength in the middle of weakness.
Then, and only then, will I experience the promise from 2 Corinthians 12:9-10
9 And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.10 Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
Heavenly Father, No matter what you serve up, let me focus on you, rather than my plate. Help me to draw on the strength that You supply. I don’t want to be self-sufficient – I want to find all that I need in You. Thank you for the trials and for drawing me close, even when I’m asking you for the opposite. amen.
And, as I say to my sweet little boy at dinner, “one is just not enough…” I hope the two of us can learn this truth together!
daily portion 